Apátridas en nuestro mundo

Según la Agencia de Naciones Unidas para los Refugiados (ACNUR), hay al menos 10 millones de apátridas en el mundo. Un apátrida es “aquella que no sea considerada como nacional por ningún Estado” (Artículo 1 de la Convención Sobre el Estatuto de los Apátridas). A estas personas apátridas se les deniega la nacionalidad, lo que causa ciertos problemas como no poder ir a la escuela, no tener atención sanitaria, no tener un contrato de trabajo, no poder abrir una cuenta bancaria, comprarse una casa, o casarse.

Una persona puede convertirse en una apátrida por muchas razones. Puede ser fruto de la discriminación contra algunos grupos étnicos, religiosos, por razón de sexo o por la emergencia de nuevos estados y la transferencia de los territorios a estados ya existentes. Es posible que una persona refugiada se convierta en apátrida.

ACNUR trabaja con los gobiernos para prevenir la apatridia, resolver casos y defender los derechos de las personas apátridas en el mundo. Presiona a los países para que adopten leyes y que se aseguren de que cada persona debe tener unos derechos básicos, así como la nacionalidad del país donde resida. En Europa Central, por ejemplo, la ACNUR pide a los países se adscriban a la Convención Sobre el Estatuto de los Apátridas de 1954 y a la Convención para Reducir los Casos de Apátrida de 1961. Supervisa a siete países en Europa Central para que mejoren las leyes.

En Estados Unidos para ser considerado como apátrida hay que demostrar que es una persona perseguida, como sucede en el caso de la petición de refugio. Pero además, los solicitantes deben demostrar que esta persecución proviene del último país de residencia habitual, y no del país de origen.

Cuando una persona se encuentra en esta situación, se enfrenta a restricciones y a la detención aleatoria, que ocurre con cierta frecuencia, no pudiendo viajar fuera de Estados Unidos. Siendo necesario que se presenten periódicamente ante la oficina de Inmigración. La mayor preocupación en Estados Unidos es la situación de las personas refugiadas indocumentadas que llegan desde México y que no tienen un estatus legal porque no llevan con ellos la partida de nacimiento de México.

Una historia conocida es la de Mikhail Sebastian que nació en la Antigua Unión Soviética y solicitó asilo en Estados Unidos durante los años 90, que le fue denegado pero Estados Unidos no pudo deportarle porque Armenia no reconoció su ciudadanía. Le llevó catorce meses conseguir el permiso para volver a su casa de Los Ángeles, California.

Mikhail es una figura visible de lo que ocurre en Estado Unidos, pero hay 10 millones de personas más que viven como Mikhail en todo el mundo. Para ayudar a estas personas, ACNUR ha hecho una campaña que llamada #IBelong con el objetivo de erradicar la apatridia para el 2024.

La campaña #IBelong ha empezó en 2014 y tiene un plan de acción de diez puntos, uno para cada año

• Acción 1: Resolver las principales situaciones actuales de apatridia.
• Acción 2: Asegurar que ningún niño que nazca sea apátrida.
• Acción 3: Eliminar la discriminación de género de las leyes de nacionalidad.
• Acción 4: Prevenir la denegación, pérdida o privación de la nacionalidad basada en criterios discriminatorios.
• Acción 5: Prevenir la apatridia en casos de sucesión de Estados.
• Acción 6: Brindar un estatuto de protección a los migrantes apátridas y facilitar su naturalización.
• Acción 7: Asegurar el registro de nacimiento para la prevención de la apatridia.
• Acción 8: Emitir documentación de nacionalidad para aquellos que tengan derecho a ella.
• Acción 9: Acceder a las Convenciones de Naciones Unidas sobre Apatridia.
• Acción 10: Mejorar los datos cuantitativos y cualitativos sobre poblaciones apátridas.

Lydia Castillo

Stateless People in our World

According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), there are at least 10 million people around the world who are stateless. A stateless person is “a person who is not considered as a national by any state under the operation of its law” (Article 1 of the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons). These stateless people are denied a nationality and this leads to problems like not being able to go to school, seek medical care, get a job, open a bank account, buy a house, or even get married.

A person can become stateless for many reasons. It can include discrimination against certain ethnic, religious groups, or gender; emergence of new states and transfers of territory between existing states; or gaps in nationality laws. It is also possible for refugees to become stateless.

The UN Refugee Agency works with governments in order to prevent statelessness, resolve cases, and defend the rights of people who are stateless around the world. They do this by lobbying countries to adopt laws that work towards solving problems of statelessness and that ensure that each person has basic human rights, as well as having citizenship. In Central Europe, for example, they urge countries to recognize the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. They oversee seven countries in Central Europe and urge them to follow Hungary as a model of good practice, since Hungary has been implementing mechanisms to protect stateless people since 2007. However, many countries still do not have proper laws in place to assist stateless people. One example of a country out of many who do not have proper laws is the United States of America.

In the U.S., in order to qualify as a stateless person, applicants are required to demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution, like refugees are required to do. However, applicants trying to qualify as a stateless person must have a fear of persecution from the country of last habitual residence, and not their country of original nationality.

When the person qualifies, they face many restrictions and obstacles. The most common obstacle is detention, which can be prolonged and occur often. Stateless people also face obstacles like difficulties obtaining work authorization and not being able to travel outside the U.S., even if family emergencies occur. Furthermore, it is required for stateless people in the U.S. to attend frequent in-person meetings with immigration officers, which limit their ability to travel outside their state of residence. A primary concern in the United States is with undocumented refugees from Mexico who have a lack of legal status due to not having a birth certificate from Mexico.

The most famous story about a stateless person in the U.S. is about a man named Mikhail Sebastian. Mikhail was born in the Soviet Union and then sought asylum in the United States during the early 1990s. He was denied asylum, however, the U.S. could not deport him because Armenia would not take Mikhail back, which is where he was born. Armenia would not recognize his citizenship and finally, the U.S. accepted Mikhail as a stateless person. In 2012, however, Mikhail was not allowed back into the mainland of the U.S. when he had a vacation to American Samoa. Immigration officials claimed that he had self-deported himself and would not allow him back into the country. It took Mikhail 14 months to get permission to return to his home in Las Angeles, California.

Mikhail is just one stateless man in one country who has faced these types of problems. There are at least 10 million other people just like Mikhail facing these types of problems in the U.S., as well as countries across the world. In order to help these stateless people, the UN Refugee Agency has launched a campaign called #IBelong. With this campaign, they hope to end statelessness by 2024.

The campaign #IBelong was launched in 2014 and has an action plan consisting of ten points, one for each year of the campaign. The actions are shown below:

• Action 1: Resolve existing major situations of statelessness
• Action 2: Ensure that no child is born stateless
• Action 3: Remove gender discrimination from nationality laws
• Action 4: Prevent denial, loss or deprivation of nationality on discriminatory grounds
• Action 5: Prevent statelessness in cases of state succession
• Action 6: Grant protection status to stateless migrants and facilitate their naturalization
• Action 7: Ensure birth registration for the prevention of statelessness
• Action 8: Issue nationality documentation to those with entitlement to it
• Action 9: Accede to the UN Statelessness Conventions
• Action 10: Improve quantitative and qualitative data on stateless populations

This campaign will help stateless people across the world gain citizenship and hopefully end statelessness once and for all.